Comments Off on USDA Invests $2 Million in Sustainable Wooden Skyscraper Designs

Last week at a meeting hosted by the White House, the USDA announced plans to host a competition encouraging architects, engineers, and builders to start designing and building high rises out of a simple and unexpected building material — wood. With so many modern buildings made of concrete and steel, it may seem like a strange choice, but the truth is that new technologies are already producing incredibly strong, lightweight, and flame-resistant timber that could drastically reduce building time and carbon emissions compared to conventional building materials . Read the rest of USDA Invests $2 Million in Sustainable Wooden Skyscraper Designs Permalink | Add to del.icio.us | digg Post tags: carbon emissions , carbon footprint , eco friendly buildings , Sustainable Building , Sustainable Construction , tall wood buildings , usda , USDA building contest , wood building , wooden highrises , wooden skyscrapers

Comments Off on GE Invests Up to $40 Million in eSolar, Takes Partnership to Next Level

Photo: eSolar Concentrating Solar Power Investment GE and eSolar were already business partners thanks to a licensing agreement with GE Energy, but they’ve decided to take their relationship to the next level and tie the knot more officially. GE is doing a “strategic investment” of up to $40 million in the Pasadena company. GE no doubt likes concentrating solar power (CSP) because it integrates well with natural gas (GE is a gas turbine maker)…… Read the full story on TreeHugger

General Electric is making a major bid to become the leading manufacturer of thin-film solar panels in the U.S. with a $600 million investment in the technology that includes plans to build the largest solar panel plant in the country

Google has long been a champion of clean energy . The search-engine giant established the Google Energy subsidiary , created energy monitoring tech like Google PowerMeter and regularly invests in clean tech start-ups like eSolar and AltaRock . And while these achievements are great, the company recently took its commitment to clean energy one step further.

Photo: Michael Graham Richard Will Also Design Battery and Hybrid Transmission Development In-House Ford, who just unveiled the new Focus , has also announced that it would invest an additional $450 million in its Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Michigan (formerly a SUV plant).

Photo: Michael Graham Richard New Compact Coupe (What an Original Name) Volkswagen had a pretty nice-looking hybrid coupe to unveil in Detroit. It’s just a concept for now, though unlike many other concept cars, this one actually looks like it could be turned into a production model with only small modifications. VW’s approach to squeeze the most miles from every gallon of fuel is to combine its already-existing fuel-saving technologies.